Intentionality Contra Physicalism on the Mind’S Independence from the Body

Intentionality contra Physicalism On the Mind’s Independence from the Body

DALLAS WILLARD† Department of Philosophy University of Southern California Los Angeles, California

BRANDON RICKABAUGH Department of Philosophy Baylor University Waco, Texas [email protected]

0DQ\SHUVRQVWRGD\ZKRUHJDUGWKHPVHOYHVDVVFLHQWL¿FDOO\PLQGHG² and who today does not—hold that only ignorance or nuttiness could explain anyone’s believing that the mind is independent of the body (mind-body dualism).1 David Braddon-Mitchel and Frank Jackson, for example, describe dualism as, “akin to explaining lightning in terms of Thor’s anger, and hence LV IXQGDPHQWDOO\ SULPLWLYH DQG SUHVFLHQWL¿F´2 Patricia Churchland calls

ABSTRACT: We argue for the mind’s independence from the body. We do so by making several moves. First, we analyze two popular kinds of reasons which have swayed many to adopt the independence of the mind from the body. Second, we advance an argument from the ontology of intentionality against the identity thesis, according to which the mind is identical to the brain. We try to show how intentionality is not reducible to or identical to the physical. Lastly, we argue that, contrary to what many materialists contend, the concept of a mind, understood as an immaterial substance, existing independently of the body is both coherent and empirically evidenced. 1. This paper has an unusual genesis. In the fall of 2011, while a graduate student at Biola University, arrangements were made so that I (Brandon) could study with Dallas Willard at the University of Southern California. I was interested in learning from Dallas about knowledge by acquaintance, intentionality, and phenomenology. Dallas passed two years later. In the summer of 2018, I visited the Dallas Willard library collection at Westmont College. There I found, among other things, a handwritten lecture by Dallas. I realized the notes were complete enough that I could turn them into a publishable paper. With the permission of Dallas’s daughter, Becky Willard-Heatley, I edited, revised, and expanded the original arguments and research so as to further Dallas’s academic work and apply some of what I learned from Dallas. The result is this paper. I am incredibly grateful to the Willard family for their support and encouragement in my efforts to bring this work to fruition. I would also like to thank Diane Ziliotto, who oversees the 'DOODV:LOODUGFROOHFWLRQIRUKHUKHOSLQ¿QGLQJWKHRULJLQDOOHFWXUHQRWHV 2. David Braddon-Mitchel and Frank Jackson, Philosophy of Mind and Cognition (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996), 8. 498 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI mind-body dualism, “an outdated theoretical curiosity.”3 Marcelo Sabatés compares belief in the immaterial mind to belief in elves and chupacabras.4 Steven Horst offers a less sensationalized appraisal: “a casual observer of recent philosophy of mind would likely come to the conclusion that, amidst DOO RI WKH GLVDJUHHPHQWV EHWZHHQ VSHFLDOLVWV LQ WKLV ¿HOG WKHUH LV DW OHDVW one thing that stands as more or less a consensus view: the commitment to a naturalistic philosophy of mind.”5 Certainly, there are interesting reasons for rejecting mind-body independence. But they are not conclusive reasons, by any means. Even those who reject mind-body independence have argued that the standard reasons for doing so are both exaggerated and ultimately fail.6 Instead of dwelling upon the issues now, we wish to point out that to the contrary, most human beings,7 and most of the great philosophers,8 have EHOLHYHGWKDWWKHPLQGZDVWRVRPHVLJQL¿FDQWGHJUHHLQGHSHQGHQWRIWKH body. In this paper, we wish to point out the sorts of reasons which provide philosophical grounds for the many persons who have accepted mind-body independence.9 In section 2 we consider whether or not there are any recent advances in knowledge which successfully undercut these reasons for mind- body independence. In doing so, we advance an argument in favor of mind-

3. Patricia Churchland, Brain Wise: Studies in Neurophilosophy (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002), 173. 4. Marcelo H. Sabatés, “Reductionism in the Philosophy of Mind,” in Encyclopedia of Phi- losophy, 2005, accessed May 10, 2017, http://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/encyclope- dias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/reductionism-philosophy-mind. 5. Steven Horst, “Naturalism in the Philosophy of Mind,” Philosophy Compass 4 (2009): 219. 6. See, e.g., William Lycan, “Giving Dualism Its Due,” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 87 (2009): 551–6; and José Gusmão Rodrigues, “There Are No Good Objections to Substance Dualism,” Philosophy 89 (2014): 199–222. 7. A number of studies in the cognitive sciences conclude that belief in mind-body independence is ubiquitous across both human history and socioeconomic divides and naturally present in early stages of human development. See, e.g., Paul Bloom, Descartes’s Baby: How WKH6FLHQFHRI&KLOG'HYHORSPHQW([SODLQV:KDW0DNHV8V+XPDQ (New York: Basic Books, 2004); P. Rochat and T. Striano, “Social-Cognitive Development in the First Year,” in Early Social Cognition: Understanding Others in the First Year of Life, ed. P. Rochat (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Earlbaum Associates, 1999), 3–34; V. A. Kuhlmeier, P. Bloom, and K. Wynn, “Do 5-Month-Old Infants See Humans as Material Objects?,” Cognition 94 (2004): 95–103; Henry M. Wellman and A. K. Hickling, “The Mind’s ‘I’: Children’s Conception of the Mind as an Ac- tive Agent,” Child Development 65 (1994): 1564–80. For a philosophical analysis of the naturalness of belief in mind-body independence, see, Uwe Meixner, “The Naturalness of Dualism,” in After Physicalism, ed. Benedickt Paul Göcke (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2012), 25–47. 8. Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, Descartes, Locke, Butler, Reid, and Kant, to name only a few, were all mind-body dualists of one kind of another. 9. Of course, most people hold to independence without these arguments. See footnote 6 for works on how most people naturally form belief in mind-body independence (substance dualism) without argument, but often by experience of one’s self. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 499 body independence from the ontological nature of intentionality.10 We argue for at least the claim that facts about intentionality can be described entirely with no need to incorporate facts about physical things. Our argument in this section explains why intentionality cannot be naturalized, cannot be reduced to or identical to the physical. Of course, this may not directly prove that any human mind is, in fact, independent of a corresponding body, that some disembodied mind or minds actually do exist. In section 3 we argue for the FODLPWKDWWKHKXPDQPLQGLVLQGHSHQGHQWRIDQ\ERG\E\UHÀHFWLQJRQSKH- nomenological and evidential considerations. Our main thesis, however, is that the ontological nature of intentionality is compelling evidence against physicalism.

1. Consciousness and the Nature of Intentionality

What, then, are the considerations which have led the majority of per- VRQVLQFOXGLQJSKLORVRSKHUVWRKROGWKDWWKHPLQGKDVDVLJQL¿FDQWGHJUHH of independence from the body? To introduce these considerations, we must ¿UVWFDOODWWHQWLRQWRDZLGHUDQJHRIIDFWVWRZKLFKHYHU\KXPDQEHLQJKDV access.11 The range of facts which we have in mind includes, as typical mem- bers, the following: my seeing you and my believing that you are awake. My hoping to convince you of the possibility that mind is independent of the body. My awareness of my leg gone to sleep. Your hearing my words. Your understanding of what I say (or your not understanding it). My sudden real- ization that one of my utterances was not actually correct. My anxiety over pollution. My decision to have breakfast in the cafeteria at work. My remem- bering to get some gas for my car. Your feeling pride in an accomplishment. Your behaving courageously or wisely. Your being depressed. Your love of music or dancing and so forth. You have before you a wide range of facts which we might agree to de- nominate the range of experiences (states of consciousness) or dispositions to have certain experiences. It is, indeed, the range of facts with which every person is most familiar, and about which she is in a position to correctly report unending details.12 If we were inclined to seek for any general char-

10. For an alternative criticism of naturalism from the ontology of intentionality, see, John J. Haldane, “Naturalism and the Problem of Intentionality,” Inquiry 32 (1989): 305–22. 11. Because of the phenomenological nature of our arguments, it is essential that we retain WKH¿UVWSHUVRQSHUVSHFWLYH+HQFHZKHQVLJQL¿FDQWZHVKLIWIURPUHIHUULQJWRRXUVHOYHVDV FRDXWKRUVWRWKH¿UVWSHUVRQSHUVSHFWLYH$VZLWKDOOSKHQRPHQRORJLFDODUJXPHQWZHLQYLWHWKH UHDGHUWRFRQVLGHUWKHLUH[SHULHQFHRIFRQVFLRXVQHVVIURPWKHLURZQ¿UVWSHUVRQSHUVSHFWLYHLQ WKHVH¿UVWSHUVRQUHÀHFWLRQV 12. For the purposes of our argument, we needn’t assume the Cartesian thesis that introspection gives us incorrigible beliefs. That may be true. However, all we need is that introspection gives us defeasible knowledge about our conscious states. This is the kind of knowledge that QHXURVFLHQWLVWVPDNHXVHRILQYDULRXVH[SHULPHQWVZKLFKUHO\RQ¿UVWSHUVRQUHSRUWV 500 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI acterization of the range of facts in question, the most successful proposal would probably turn out to be the character of intentionality. Each experience we have—with only a few questionable cases—has intentionality as each is of or about something other than itself.13 My awareness of my leg gone to sleep, for example, is an experience or state of consciousness that is of or about my leg.14

1.1. Some Background on the Phenomenological Concept of Intentionality

A phenomenological concept of intentionality ties together subjective mental states or acts with objective (that is, mind-independent) objects and facts. Phenomenological accounts of intentionality look for, as Tim Crane notes, “a sense in which something is ‘given’ to the mind in sensation and emotion, just as something is given to the mind in thought and experience . . . in sensation something is felt, in emotion, something is apprehended . . . .”15 Hence, intentionality is prioritized as a phenomenological notion. The immediate antecedents of the phenomenological concept of intentionality are in the thought Franz Brentano: Every mental phenomenon is characterized by what the Scholastics of the Middle Ages called the intentional (or mental) inexistence [in- existenz] of an object [Gegenstand], and what we might call, though not wholly unambiguously, reference to a content, direction toward an object (which is not to be understood here as meaning a thing), or immanent objectivity. Every mental phenomenon includes something as an object within itself,16 although they do not all do so in the same way. In presentation something is presented, in judgment something LVDI¿UPHGRUGHQLHGLQORYHORYHGLQKDWHKDWHGLQGHVLUHGHVLUHG and so on.

13. For a defense of intentionalism (the thesis that all mental states have intentionality), see Tim Crane, “The Intentional Structure of Consciousness,” in Consciousness: New Philosophi- cal Perspectives, ed. Quentin Smith and Aleksandar Jokic (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 33–56. 14. Another crucial factor many philosophers would identify as a characteristic of this range of facts would be phenomenal consciousness, that each has a “what it’s like” sense to be in that mental state. We have chosen to set this aside and focus on intentionality. However, those at- tracted to phenomenal intentionality the thesis that intentionality that is constituted by phenom- HQDOFRQVFLRXVQHVVPD\¿QGWKDWRXUDUJXPHQWH[WHQGVWRSKHQRPHQDOFRQVFLRXVQHVVDVZHOO 15. Tim Crane, “Intentionality as the Mark of the Mental,” in Contemporary Issues in the Philosophy of Mind, ed. Anthony O’Hear (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 243. 16. This talk of “immanence” and “inclusion” in consciousness is very dangerous, leading to what Sartre calls “the illusion of immanence.” See, Jean-Paul Sartre, The Psychology of Imagi- nation (1940; London: Routledge, 2000), chap. 2; and Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness (1943; New York: Washington Square, 1992), 187. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 501

This intentional in-existence is characteristic exclusively of mental phenomena. No physical phenomenon exhibits anything like it. We can, therefore, GH¿QHPHQWDOSKHQRPHQDE\VD\LQJWKDWWKH\DUHWKRVHSKHQRPHQDZKLFK contain an object intentionally within themselves.17 The Latin source of “intentionality” is “intention,” which refers to a stretching out, or an extending, toward something. Intentio is, in the Aristo- telian terminology, the actuality or act of thought, the actual stretching out of the mind toward its objects as it sees, imagines, remembers, infers, believes, and knows. Intentionality, understood in this Husserlian sense, is not a sim- SOHEHDPWKDWIDOOVRQYDULRXVREMHFWLRQVOLNHDÀDVKOLJKW7KHZRUG³DFW´LV thus often used in the literature of philosophy as equivalent with “intention” (intentio). But it always refers, in this use to an actuality, an actual determination of the mind, not to a mental activity or change of mental states, a mental doing.18 To “act,” to “intend” in this sense, is merely to instance a referential quality.19 The following passage from Thomas Aquinas and from Aristotle, respectively, may help to clear up this point, and also give some of LWVKLVWRU\&RQVLGHU¿UVWWKHIROORZLQJOLQHRIWKRXJKWIURP7KRPDV There are two kinds of action, as is said in the 9th book of Metaphysics. One passes over into something external, bringing passion to it; for instance, the actions of burning and sawing. The second kind of action does not pass over into external things but instead remains within the agent itself; for instance, the actions of sensing, understanding, and willing. But in the latter kind of action, no change is produced in an external thing; instead the action is done entirely within the agent. “As IRUWKH¿UVWNLQGRIDFWLRQLWLVREYLRXVWKDWLWFDQQRWEHWKHDJHQW¶VDFW of being, for the agent’s act of being means something within it, which WKLVVRUWRIDFWLRQLVDÀRZLQJRXWWRDQDFWFDXVHGE\WKHDJHQW20 Now consider where Aristotle writes, For the action is the end, and the actuality is the action. Therefore even the word ‘actuality’ is derived from ‘action,’ and points to the IXO¿OOPHQW And while in some cases the exercise is the ultimate thing (e.g. in sight the ultimate thing is seeing, and no other product besides this

17. Franz Brentano, Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint (1874; London: Routledge, 2015), book 2.1 (pp. 92–3). 18. See Edmund Husserl, Logical InvestigationsIRRWQRWHWRVHFRIWKH¿IWK³/RJLFDO Investigation.” For an excellent overview of Husserl’s impact on Willard’s views, see, Greg Jesson, “The Husserlian Roots of Dallas Willard’s Philosophical and Religious Works,” Phi- losophia Christi 16 (2014): 7–36. 19. For a very helpful explanation of the nature of intentionality, see, Greg Jesson, “Is In- tentionality More Like Hitting or More Like Hunting: Gustav Bergmann on Skepticism and Knowledge,” in Philosophical Analysis: Fostering the Ontological Turn: Gustav Bergmann (1906–1987), ed. Rosaria Egidi and Guido Bonino (München: Walter de Gruyter, 2013), 125– 45. 20. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Ia, q.54, a.2. 502 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI

results from sight), but from some things a product follows (e.g. from the art of building there results a house as well as the act of building), yet none the less the act is in the former case the end and in the latter more of an end than the mere potentiality is. For the act of building is the thing that is being built, and comes to be—and is—at the same time as the house. Where, then, the result is something apart from the exercise, the actuality is in the thing that is being made, e.g. the act of building is in the thing that is being built and that of weaving in the thing that is being woven, and similarly in all other cases, and in general the movement is in the thing that is being moved; but when there is no product apart from the actuality, the actuality is in the agents, e.g., the act of seeing is in the seeing subject and that of theorizing in the theorizing subject and the life is in the soul (and therefore well-being also; for it is a certain kind of life).21 Another kind of ofness, that of inherence, is showed by intentional- determinations and determinations of all sorts, for example, colors, shapes, VRXQGVDQGÀDYRUV%XWFRORUVVKDSHVVRXQGVDQGÀDYRUVDUHQRWabout anything as my belief that you fear me is about you. It is an intentional determination of me, but while not a determination of you, it is about you.22 7KHVLJQL¿FDQFHRILQWHQWLRQDOLW\PXVWQRWEHORVWRQXV:LWKRXWLQWHQ- tionality there are no minds in the same sense that without triangularity there are no triangles.23 “Intentionality,” as Gustav Bergmann rightly asserts, “is the essence of mind.”247KLVLVWUXHEHFDXVHZKDWLVGH¿QLWLYHDERXWWKHPLQG is its intentional power to reach out and grasp mind-independent reality, making, among other things, knowledge possible.25 Reinhardt Grossmann 21. Aristotle, Metaphysics, in 7KH&RPSOHWH:RUNVRI$ULVWRWOH, ed. Jonathan Barnes, vol. 2 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), 1050a22–35. For Hume’s statement of intentionality see paragraph seven of his essay, “Of the Standard of Taste.” 22. For more on this understanding of intentionality, see, Dallas Willard, “For Lack of In- tentionality,” in Phenomenology 2005, vol. 5, Selected Essays from North America, ed. Lester Embree and Thomas Nenon (Bucharest: Zeta Books, 2007), 593–611; Dallas Willard, “Inten- tionality and the Substance of the Self,” Philosophia Christi 13 (2011): 7–20; Dallas Willard, “A Critical Study of Husserl and Intentionality (I),” Journal of the British Society for Phenomenol- ogy 19 (1988): 186–98; and Dallas Willard, “A Critical Study of Husserl and Intentionality (II),” Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology 19 (1988): 311–22. 23. In a different sense, if one holds to the virtually self-evident proposition that thoughts require thinkers, then for the range of mental facts before us, there would be no individual mental states without minds. For an interesting argument for substance dualism from this fact, see, E. J. Lowe, “Why My Body Is Not Me: The Unity Argument for Emergentist Self-Body Dualism,” in Contemporary Dualism: A Defense, ed. Andrea Lavazza and Howard Robinson (New York: Routledge, 2014), 245–65. 24. Gustav Bergmann, The Metaphysics of Logical Positivism (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1954), ix. 25. For more on this, see, Dallas Willard, “How Concepts Relate the Mind to Its Objects: The ‘God’s Eye View’ Vindicated?,” Philosophia Christi 1, no. 2 (1999): 5–20; and Dallas Willard, “Knowledge,” in The Cambridge Companion to Husserl, ed. Barry Smith and David Woodruff Smith (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 138–67. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 503 observes, “The intentional nexus must be a unique kind of connection. It VHHPVWREHLUUHGXFLEOHWRDQ\WKLQJZKLFKZH¿QGLQWKHQRQPHQWDOZRUOG Its occurrence truly distinguishes between a world with minds and a world without minds.”26 Of course, we are in a world populated by minds. Hence, the logical structure of the world cannot obtain, as it is presently, if there is no mind, no consciousness, no intentionality.27 So, it seems that if we are to offer a plausible account of what is real intentionality cannot be eliminated. But, does intentionality favor the dependence or the independence of the mind from the body?

1.2. Why Think Mind and Body Are Independent?

In order to have a simple way of speaking, let us call our intentional determination I-facts, and our nonintentional determinations P-facts (physical facts). Returning to our initial problem, we now ask: What are the considerations which have led the majority of persons, including philosophers, to hold that I-factsKDYHDVLJQL¿FDQWGHJUHHRILQGHSHQGHQFHIURPP-facts? There are two principal considerations (or classes of considerations) which have led to this position. 6SHFL¿FLW\ Most, if not all, I-factFDQEHH[DFWO\VSHFL¿HGZLWKRXW mention of a single P-fact about the person, and no list of P-facts can serve to specify any I-fact. We have to use “most” here, because some decisions to do certain things certainly seem to involve movements of one’s body. The remaining I-facts, KRZHYHUDUHLGHQWL¿HGZLWKRXWDQ\GLUHFWUHIHUHQFHWRP-facts. Of course, those which intend P-facts require for their description intentions of such facts; but such an intention (such as aboutness) is not the intended fact itself. For example, I now am aware that I see you. This seeing is given to me. I recognize it and distinguish it from the hearing of my words as I utter them. But this seeing is not given to me as any fact about my body. What I recognize is not that a certain P-fact obtains. Anyone who denies this must indicate which P-fact it is that I recognize when I recognize that I am seeing \RX%XWDQ\RQHZKRXQGHUVWDQGVWKLVZLOOLPPHGLDWHO\¿QGRXWWKDWLWLVDQ impossible task. It is really this consideration which Descartes has in mind when he says: Thus, simply by knowing that I exist, and seeing at the same time that absolutely nothing else belongs to my nature or essence except that I am a thinking thing, I can infer correctly that my essence consists

26. Reinhardt Grossmann, The Structure of Mind (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1965), 170–1. 27. Gustav Bergmann, Logic and Reality (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1960/1964), 33. 504 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI

solely in the fact that I am a thinking thing [or a substance whose whole essence, or nature is to think]. It is true that I may have (or, to anticipate, that I certainly have) a body that is very closely joined to me. But, nevertheless, on the one hand I have a clear and distinct idea of myself, in so far as I am simply a thinking, non-extended thing; and on the other hand I have a distinct idea of body, in so far as this is simple an extended, non-thinking thing. An accordingly, it is certain that I [that is to say, my soul by which I am what I am] am really distinct from my body, and can exist without it.28 A contemporary variant of this issue is what Joseph Levine calls the explanatory gap: our inability to provide or even comprehend a plausible explanation of how consciousness could depend upon a physical nonconscious substrate.29 If we cannot deduce consciousness (I-facts) from the physical (P-facts), then explaining consciousness wholly in terms of P-facts seems impossible. Attempts at such an explanation constitute what David Chalmers calls, “the hard problem of consciousness.”30 As of late, most think the hard problem is unsolvable, leaving the explanatory gap unresolved. Ned Block and Robert Stalnaker observe, “No one has ever given an account, even a highly speculative, hypothetical, and incomplete account of how a physical thing could have phenomenal states.”31 However, if the phenomenological conception of intentionality is true, then the hard problem of phenomenal consciousness brings with it the harder problem of intentionality.32 This, then, is one main type of consideration which has led people to regard the mind (I-facts) as independent of the body (P-facts). A second main FRQVLGHUDWLRQLVQRWXQUHODWHGWRWKLV¿UVWRQHEXWLWDWOHDVWLQYROYHVDVHSD- rate emphasis. We may put this emphasis as follows: Nondetermination: Predicates involved in I-facts (call these I-predicates) cannot be determinations of bodies. What are these I-predicates? Here is a list of what we have in mind: (a DERXWQHVVRULQWHQWLRQDOLW\ VSHFL¿FDERXWQHVV (b) truth/falsity; (c) I-relations (relations between thought and reality);

28. Rene Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy, in The Philosophical Writings of Des- cartes, vol. 2, trans. John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff, and Dugald Murdoch (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995), Meditation 6.78 (p. 54). 29. Joseph Levine, “Materialism and Qualia: The Explanatory Gap,” 3DFL¿F3KLORVRSKLFDO Quarterly 64 (1983): 354–61. 30. David Chalmers, The Conscious Mind (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 25. 31. Ned Block and Robert Stalnaker, “Conceptual Analysis, Dualism, and the Explanatory Gap,” Philosophical Review 108 (1999): 1. 32. For more on this compounded problem, see, George Bealer, “Materialism and the Logi- cal Structure of Intentionality,” in Objections to Physicalism, ed. Howard Robinson (Oxford: Clarendon, 1993), 101–26; and E. J. Lowe, “There Are No Easy Problems of Consciousness,” Journal of Consciousness Studies 2 (1995): 206–71. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 505

(d) clarity, obscurity, or fuzziness; (e) emotional qualities, for example, love or hate; ( f ) spontaneity (Plato, Laws, book 10: self-moved); and (g) lack of spatiality or individuality (Theaetetus, Plotinus, Descartes). Now obviously any argument from predicates assumes that bodies can have only a restricted range of predicates and that things with certain types of predicates cannot have predicates of other types. Perhaps all we know is that some things with P-predicates, in fact, do not have I-predicates, for example, pebbles and daisies. But we think that it is clear, in general, that a mere difference in kind of predicate does not mean that the things with the predicate are dependent or independent of each other. That question remains quite open. For example, if x is sweet and y is white, that leaves it quite open whether or not x and y have any relation of dependence. Indeed, it also leaves it quite open whether or not x and y are identical. The same is true if we consider x is thinking of Paris and y is six feet tall. This second consideration that has led persons to suspect the independence of I-facts and P-factsVXUHO\GRHVQRWORRNFRQFOXVLYHDWDOO7KH¿UVW consideration also fails to prove independence, simply because the description of what an I-fact (or any fact) is tells us nothing about what it depends upon, or what depends upon it. Much more must be said and defended if independence is to be established from such consideration. Dualist treatments of the explanatory gap problem attempt to make such a case.

2. The Identity Thesis

Let us now look at an argument from the other side, one which purports to prove that I-facts cannot be independent of P-facts, that intentionality cannot be independent of physicality: the identity thesis. The identity thesis holds that every I-fact is, in fact, the same as a certain collection of particles located in the familiar sort of physical object called a brain. Exactly how we are to describe these collections is not clear, even to physicists. But whatever terms they decide on shall be the ones used to specify these P-processes in the brain.

2.1. Contra the Identity Thesis

Now if we can suppose that the claim of the identity thesis is clear, we can go on to ask: what reason is there to believe that it is true? Why think that the mind just is the brain? No one has ever suggested that there is perceptual evidence for saying that I-facts are identical with P-facts. For example, people once thought that the Morning Star was not identical to the Evening Star. 506 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI

However, astronomers discovered that what was referred to as “the Morning Star” and “the Evening Star” are in fact identical, as both expressions refer to Venus. This, however, is not parallel with the thesis that I-facts are identical with P-facts. No one has suggested that there is perceptual evidence that I- facts are identical with P-facts. The only reason ever given is economy—that is, all is explained without introducing I-facts.33 But now we wish to show that the identity thesis is false. If we are going to claim that certain items are identical, we must be able to distinguish them from other things, and from each other. This can be done only in terms of properties and relations. However, ZHGRQRWSLFNRXWRXUH[SHULHQFHV by means of P-qualities or relations. Consider the case just mentioned. At a certain time, those who studied the heavenly bodies said that the Morning Star is identical with the Evening Star. Now, this claim of identity presupposes certain differences. To speak roughly, it presupposes that being last YLVLEOHLQWKH0RUQLQJ WKH0RUQLQJ6WDU LVGLIIHUHQWWKDQEHLQJ¿UVWYLVLEOH in the Evening (the Evening Star). If this presupposition did not obtain and hold true, then “the Morning Star is identical with the Evening Star” would not differ from “the Morning Star is identical with the Morning Star” (or else “the Evening Star is identical with the Evening Star”). A similar case is presented by the identity of Dr. Jekyll with Mr. Hyde. We may generalize from such cases in the following way: if identity is asserted between items given with the same determinations, or under the same description, then the identity claim in question is a tautology. For example: “This F is identical with this F” or “That which F’s is identical with that which F’s” or “This is identical with this.” If an identity is not tautolo- JRXVWKHLWHPVLGHQWL¿HGPXVWEHJLYHQZLWKQRQLGHQWLFDOGHWHUPLQDWLRQV or descriptions. That is, the condition of a nontautologous identity being meaningful is a difference in the determinations of the things claimed to be identical. For example, in our Morning Star is identical with the Evening Star FDVHZKLFKLVDQRQWDXWRORJRXVWUXHLGHQWLW\FODLPWKHWKLQJVLGHQWL¿HGDUH referred to by means of certain determinations stated alone, and these determinations are not themselves the same (for example, being last visible in the PRUQLQJLVGLIIHUHQWWKDQEHLQJ¿UVWYLVLEOHLQWKHHYHQLQJ Now let us consider the “identity thesis” in the light of these general considerations about identity claims. The identity thesis asserts that, for example, my seeing of this sheet of paper is (nontautologously) identical with DFHUWDLQVWDWHRIP\EUDLQVSHFL¿FDOO\LQWHUPVRISK\VLFDOSDUWLFOHV,IZH understand the thesis in one way, it is unexceptional, at least so far as the general considerations about identity claims just sketched are concerned. This is where we take the thesis to assert that which has the intentional quality of being a perception of this paper is the same thing as that which has the

33. See, e.g., Smart, “Sensations and Brain Processes,” Philosophical Review 68 (1959): 142. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 507 physical properties and relations. Understood in this way, the claim that my seeing of this sheet of paper is identical with a certain physical state is the same type of claim as the claim that the Morning Star is the Evening Star, or that Dr. Jekyll is Mr. Hyde. But this interpretation is not what the identity thesis proposes. This would not yield physical-particle-monism. It proposes to say that there are no determinations other than P-determinations, that if any determinations at all are had in mind with “my seeing this paper” in “my seeing this paper is LGHQWLFDOZLWKDEUDLQVWDWH VSHFL¿HGLQWKHWHUPVRISK\VLFV ´WKH\PXVWEH the very P-determinations cited in the second half of the identity claim; for these are the only determinations there are. Hence, the identity thesis seem- ingly reduces to the claim that “my perceiving this paper is identical with a certain brain state” is really the tautology that a certain brain state is identical with itself. But no identity theorist has even said such a thing; and to the contrary, they have explicitly denied that the identities claimed are tautologies.34 But what alternatives are left? Only, it seems, one of the following three. In comparing “my perceiving this paper is identical with a brain state S1” with “my perceiving this paper” one has in mind either: (1) No determinations at all.35 (2) Certain P-determinations, but not exactly the same ones had in

mind with “brain state S2.” (3) Certain non-P-determinations. &OHDUO\ IDOVL¿HVWKHLGHQWLW\WKHVLVDVLWHQWDLOVWKDWnon-P-determinations just are P-determinations. (2) is factually false. J. J. C. Smart, for example, admits that “I am perceiving this paper” does not mean, “I have such and such a brain-process.”36 This leaves us with only (1); and it is, indeed, this alternative which both Smart and Armstrong attempt to take. With what success, we shall see. In fact, what Smart and Armstrong attempt to do is to create an illusion that they are taking (1), while in fact taking (3) and surrendering the thesis of identity. We shall try to show how they do this, and then why they must do it.

34. E.g., Paul and Patricia Churchland explain that “intertheoretic reduction is at bottom a relation between two distinct FRQFHSWXDOIUDPHZRUNVfor describing the phenomena . . .” (P. M. Churchland and P. S. Churchland, “Intertheoretic Reduction: A Neuroscientist’s Field Guide,” in Neurophilosophy and Alzheimer’s Disease, ed. Christen and P. Churchland (London: Springer- Verlag, 1992), 21–2). 35. This is redundant by the general conditions of nontautological identity claims stated above. 36. See Smart’s replies to objections (2) and (5) in J. J. C. Smart, “Sensations and Brain Processes,” 141–56. 508 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI

2.2. How Smart and Armstrong Embrace (1) and (3)

Smart and Armstrong each attempt to hold that I pick out my perceiving this paper by means of the relational properties which the P-event that it is has to other P-events. They deny that we pick it out by means of its qualities. Armstrong’s way of putting this is to deny that our grasp of mental events, such as my seeing this sheet of paper, in anyway informs us of the “intrinsic nature” of these events.37 The relations which, according to Smart and Armstrong, form the content or connotation of our mental concepts are resemblance38 and causality,39 with resemblance added to causality to handle certain marginal cases.40 Strictly speaking, Armstrong uses aptness to cause behavior or aptness to be caused by certain objects. Other identity theorists, VXFKDV'DYLG/HZLVH[SOLFLWO\KROGWKDW³7KHGH¿QLWLYHFKDUDFWHULVWLFRI any (sort of) experience as such is its causal role,” and that “these causal roles which belong by analytic necessity to experiences belong in fact to certain physical states.”41 To avoid long-windedness, we shall speak simply of causality. Smart, for example, uses the locution “something is going on which is like what is going on when . . .” as an equivalent for the statement that “I am perceiving this sheet of paper.” He says: Notice that the italicized words, namely ‘there is something going on which is like what is going on when,’ are all quasilogical or topic- neutral words. This explains why the ancient Greek peasant’s reports about his sensations can be neutral between dualistic metaphysics of my materialistic metaphysics. It explains how sensations can be brain- processes and yet how a man who reports them need know nothing about brain-processes. For he reports them only very abstractly as “something going on which is like what is going on when . . . .42 Notice how Smart contradicts himself here. He says that when I report my perceptions of this paper I: (i) need know nothing of the brain-process which is the perception, yet (ii) know that it is like (or that it resembles) certain other brain processes. 1RWLFHWKDW L UHÀHFWVWKHQHFHVVLW\WRGHQ\ LQRUGHUWRPDLQWDLQWKHLGHQ- WLW\WKHVLVZKLOH LL UHÀHFWVWKHQHFHVVLW\WRKDYHVRPHGHWHUPLQDWLRQVE\

37. D. M. Armstrong, A Materialist Theory of Mind, rev, ed. (London: Routledge, 1992), 79. 38. Smart, “Sensations and Brain Processes,” 141. 39. Armstrong, A Materialist Theory of Mind, 79. 40. Ibid., 83. 41. David Lewis, “An Argument for the Identity Theory,” in Philosophical Papers, vol. 1 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983), 100. 42. Smart, “Sensations and Brain Processes,” 150. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 509 means of which to pick out or distinguish the event reported (i.e., my seeing this paper). But (i) and (ii) are contradictory. Further, likeness or resemblance is not a primitive term in the language of physics. Hence, it falls under the category of non-P-determinates. Further, the brain-processes in question are not inseparable changes in WKDWSLHFHRIÀHVKFDOOHGWKHEUDLQEXWVRPHFKDQJHLQWKHVWDWHVRIWKHXOWL- mate particles of physics. Smart holds that when I report my sensing this paper, I report a resemblance of this particle process with other such processes. This puts him in a different position. For, now Smart must say whether or not he is aware of these processes. If he says he is not, he must then account for the ability to correctly report them, or (something else) for his knowledge that they are occurring. What could he enlist here? Intimate knowledge, some preestablished harmony or some causal relation of the particle-process which is the knowledge (or report) of the seeing of the paper to the particle- process which is the seeing of the paper?43 Alternatives to awareness of the particle process which allegedly is the perception of the paper, as an account for the ability to report it, all seem extremely unlikely, and no identity theorist has worked them out. And yet if we say that we are aware of these particle processes in the brain, we are claiming direct awareness of the ultimate particles of physics. Surely that is absurd. But we believe it is an absurdity to which one is inexorably pushed when he attempts to identify my perceiving this paper with a physics-particle state of my brain. If we are right, the absurdity deduced proves the identity thesis false. But it would certainly also be wrong to concede Smart’s point that mental reports are “only very abstractly”44 made, or Armstrong’s claim that intro- spective reports “give us such meager information about the intrinsic nature of mental events.”45 If we say that there is a dog in the corridor, that statement is abstract. It is further determinable along such lines as the following: the dog is black, white, and so on, is large or small, is male or female, is a spaniel, or a Great Dane, an Afghan, and so on. But if I tell you that I have a very sharp and detailed perception of this sheet of paper here in my hand there is very little that could be done to further specify the event which I am reporting; and, in any case, certainly not so much as with the report that “something or other is happening like what happens when . . . .” Finally, when I report that I see this sheet of paper, I am not reporting any resemblance or causality of aptness to cause what so ever. If I wished to report a resemblance (or aptness to cause or be caused), I know how to do it, and it is not by saying that I see this sheet of paper. Only the ad hoc re-

43. For a related argument against physicalism that exploits this issue, see, J. P. Moreland and Brandon Rickabaugh, “The Plausibility of Property Dualism and the Intelligibility of a Spiritual Substance: A Reply to Churchland,” in Christianity and Science in Dialogue, ed. Na- talia Pecherskaya (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2019). 44. Armstrong, A Materialist Theory of Mind, 40. 45. Ibid., 99. 510 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI quirements of an absurd theory make philosophers suggest analyses such as Smart’s or Armstrong’s proposal about “I see this sheet of paper.” One cannot say that x resembles y without mentioning resemblance. And the reason why I do not mention resemblance when I say “I see this sheet of paper” is because I am not talking about any resemblance. I am stating a single fact, consisting of this having present to me. That fact does not contain any relation of resemblance, and it is only because that fact is what it is, that it may resemble, and may be known to resemble, other facts such as my seeing this other sheet of paper. Similar remarks apply to causality. Now all of the above criticisms of Smart’s attempt to give a content to the phrase “my seeing this sheet of paper” in terms of resemblance of particle processes can easily be reduplicated with reference to Armstrong simply by reformulating Smart’s claims, replacing claims of likeness of particle-process by claims of the aptness of these processes to be caused by, or to cause, certain sorts of physical events. We shall not bother to do that here, as no difference of principle is involved, and Armstrong’s version of the identity thesis turns out as self-contradictory and contrary to facts as did Smart’s.

2.3. Why Must Smart and Armstrong Embrace (1) and (3)?

It remains, however, to explain why both philosophers get into the absurd position of trying to hold to both (1) and (3) above. The answer is brief: only (1) will allow them to maintain identity, by not requiring a difference of GHWHUPLQDWLRQVSHFL¿HGE\³P\VHHLQJWKLVVKHHWRISDSHU´%XWRQO\ ZLOO allow them to meet the general condition of nontautologous identity claims, namely, that the things said to be identical must be given with nonidentical determinations or descriptions. They must have difference to claim identity, but if they have the difference required, they cannot get the identity that they want. So, we think we can take the identity of I-facts with P-facts as disproven.

2.4. Summary Thus Far

This returns us, then, to the question of this relation, and, in particular, of their dependence of independence. But before going on, let us summarize our results thus far. We reviewed two main (classes of) considerations which have led many thoughtful persons to conclude that the mental is independent of the physical. But these considerations, we saw, prove only that the mental is distinct from the physical, not that it is independent of the physical body. We then showed, or tried to show, that the attempt of the identity thesis to do away with the distinctness of the mental and the physical does not succeed. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 511

We would put this result in this way: we have proven that it is absurd to think that an I-fact could be a P-fact. It is as absurd as to think that a shape might be an odor or a sound a color. Intentionality is not reducible to or identical to WKHSK\VLFDO0DWHULDOLVWVXQGHUVWDQGDQGHYHQDGPLWRIWKLVGLI¿FXOW\-HUU\ Fodor, for example, states, I suppose that sooner or later the physicalists will complete the cata- logue they’ve been compiling of the ultimate and irreducible properties of things. When they do, the likes of spin, charm, and charge will perhaps appear upon their list. But aboutness surely won’t; intentionality simply doesn’t go that deep. . . . If the semantic and intentional are real properties [I-facts], it must be in virtue of their identity with (or maybe their supervenience on?) properties that are themselves neither intentional nor semantic. If aboutness is real, it must be something else.46 According to Fodor, the rejection of a realist view of intentionality is moti- vated not by argument, but by “a certain ontological intuition: that there is no place for intentional categories in a physicalistic view of the world; that the intentional can’t be naturalize.”47 If we are right, we’ve offered an argument that explains why intentionality cannot be naturalized, cannot be identical to the physical.

3. The Independence of Body and Soul

You will clearly see that the previous argument does not prove that any human mind is, in fact, independent of a corresponding body, that some disembodied mind or minds actually do exist. We have reservations that any a priori proof on either side of this question can be made out.48 But, if we look at empirical evidence, we believe with C. J. Ducasse,

46. Jerry Fodor, Psychosemantics (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1987), 97. 47. Ibid. 7KLVLVQ¶WWRVD\ZH¿QGSKLORVRSKLFDODUJXPHQWVIRUVXEVWDQFHGXDOLVPXQFRQYLQFLQJ Quite to the contrary. See, e.g., Jonathan Loose, Angus Menuge, and J. P. Moreland, eds., The %ODFNZHOO&RPSDQLRQWR6XEVWDQFH'XDOLVP (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2018); Howard Rob- inson, From the Knowledge Argument to Mental Substance (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016); C. Stephen Evans and Brandon Rickabaugh, “What Does It Mean to Be a Bodily Soul?,” Philosophia Christi 17 (2015): 315–30; Howard Robinson and A. Lavazza, eds., Con- temporary Dualism: A Defense (London: Routledge, 2013); Richard Swinburne, Mind, Brain and Free Will (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013); Mark C. Baker and Stewart Goetz, eds., The Soul Hypothesis: Investigation into the Existence of the Soul (New York: Continuum, 2011); J. P. Moreland, The Recalcitrant Imago Dei: Human Persons and the Failure of Natural- ism (London: SCM, 2009); Alessandro Antonietti, Antonella Corradini, and Jonathan Lowe, eds., Psycho-Physical Dualism Today: An Interdisciplinary Approach (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2008); and Uwe Meixner, The Two Sides of Being: A Reassessment of Psycho-Physical Dualism (Paderborn, Mentis-Verlag, 2004). 512 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI

That the balance of the evidence so far (thus) obtained is on the side of the ability of survival (after death) and, in the best cases (studied), of survival not merely of memories of the life on earth, but of survival DOVRRIWKHPRVWVLJQL¿FDQWFDSDFLWLHVRIWKHKXPDQPLQGDQGRIFRQ- tinuing exercise of these.49 When looked at carefully, empirical evidence for the continued existence of some disembodied persons seems to us such that it would be irrational not to believe that there are some such persons.50 Regarding the implications of evidential near-death experiences (NDE) for the thesis of mind-body independence, Habermas observes, Yet it seems safe to say that the most common impression among scholars, it that aspects of this research such as the NDEr’s perception of leaving her body and looking down at it from above seem quite strongly to favor a dualist perspective about the self and consciousness.51 Of course, the details of NDE studies should be considered more fully.52 However, the philosophy of mind has largely ignored this set of data, and we mention it here to draw attention to this data and its relevance to the independence thesis. The only sorts of nonempirical or a priori consideration which are of use here are (i) those such as were given above, which hope to show that it is not impossible that the mind is independent of bodies; and (ii) those, such as we shall now close with, which try to stretch the imagination and enable one to envision what such a disembodied existence might be like. In this endeavor of stretching our imagination Armstrong, himself a materialist, is of some help.

49. C. J. Ducasse, A Critical Examination of the Belief in a Life after Death 6SULQJ¿HOG,/ Charles C. Thomas, 1961), 203. 50. For Willard’s pastoral thoughts on NDEs and related matters, see his work, The Di- vine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God (New York, NY: HarperCollins 1997), 397–8, esp. 397. 51. Gary R. Habermas, “Evidential Near-Death Experiences,” in 7KH%ODFNZHOO&RPSDQLRQ to Substance Dualism, ed. Jonathan J. Loose, Angus J. L. Menuge, and J. P. Moreland (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2018), 243. 52. See David Lund, Persons, Souls and Death: A Philosophical Investigation of an Afterlife (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2009); and J. Steve Miller, Near-Death Experiences as Evidence for the Existence of God and Heaven (Acworth, GA: Wisdom Creek, 2012). According to Gary Habermas (in a personal email exchange) the following are the top academic works on the evidence for NDEs which physicalism cannot account for: Janice Miner Holden, “Veridical Perception in Near-Death Experiences,” in 7KH+DQGERRNRI1HDU'HDWK([SHULHQFHV, ed. Jan- ice Holden, Bruce Greyson, and Debbie James (Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2009), 185–212; Bruce Greyson, “Comments on ‘Does Paranormal Perception Occur in Near-Death Experienc- es?,’” Journal of Near-Death Studies 25 (2007): 237–9; Bruce Greyson, “Seeing Dead People Not Known to Have Died: ‘Peak in Darien’ Experiences,” Anthropology and Humanism 35 ±DQG%UXFH*UH\VRQ³:HVWHUQ6FLHQWL¿F$SSURDFKHVWR1HDU'HDWK([SHUL- ences,” Humanities 4 (2015): 775–96. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 513

But disembodied existence seems to be a perfectly intelligible suppo- sition. It may be that a good deal of perception in some sense presupposes that we have a body or at least a position in space. For instance, we see things as oriented in space with respect to us, and it is hard to see what ‘us’ refers to here if not to our body. But consider the case where I am lying in bed at night thinking. Surely it is logically possible that I might be having just the same experiences, and yet not have a body at all? No doubt I am having certain somatic, that is to say, bodily, sensations. But if I am lying still, these will not very detailed in nature, and I can see nothing self-contradictory in supposing that they do not correspond to anything in physical reality, yet I need be in no doubt about my identity.53 H. H. Price also tries to imagine such a disembodied existence from his bed. He remarks: The next world, I think, might be conceived as a kind of dream-world. When we are asleep, sensory stimuli are cut off, or at any rate, are pre- vented from having their normal effects upon our brain-centers. But we still manage to have experiences. It is true that sense-perception no ORQJHURFFXUVEXWVRPHWKLQJVXI¿FLHQWO\OLNHLWGRHV,QVOHHSRXULP- age-producing powers, which are more or less inhibited in waking like by a conscious bombardment of sensory stimuli, are released from this inhibition. And then we are provided with a multitude of objects of awareness, about which we have desires and emotions. These objects which we are aware of behave in a way which seems very queer to us when we wake up. The laws of their behavior are not the laws of physics. But however queer their behavior is, it does not disconcert us at the time, and our personal identity is not broken. “In other words,” says Price, “my suggestion is that the next world, if there is one, might be a world of mental images.”54 Price is offering a logically coherent description of the “next world” against charges of the inconceivability and logical incoherence of life after death by philosophers such as C. D. Broad, Antony Flew, and John Hospers, that life after death is inconceivable, logically incoherent, and therefore impossible.55 For our present purposes, it LVVXI¿FLHQWWRFDOODWWHQWLRQWRWKHVHVHJPHQWVRIH[SHULHQFHZLWKQRERG\ referenced as a model of what disembodied existence might be like. If then, we were to put this picture or model of disembodied existence into conjunction with the phase of embodied existence, we might get a tem- porally extended model of the person of the following sort. A substantive or subject of change exists from t1–tn as follows:

53. Armstrong, A Materialist Theory of Mind, 19. 54. H. H. Price, “Survival and the Idea of ‘Another World,’” in Brain and Mind: Modern Concepts of the Nature of Mind, ed. J. R. Smythies (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1965), 4. 55. It is worth noting that Price’s tendencies toward a narrow empiricist manifest themselves strongly in his failure to deal with consciousness-of or intentionality. 514 PHILOSOPHIA CHRISTI t1 t2 t3 tn { { { Physical Features Only Physical Features & Intentional Features Only Intentional Features

FIGURE 1. Ontological Phases of Embodied Existence

t2 and t3 may mark points of radical transformation. Certainly, also, the period from t2–t3 on this model is one wherein vast change occurs in the physical DQGLQWHQWLRQDOVWUXFWXUHVRIWKHVHOILGHQWL¿HGVXEVWDQFHLQYROYHG7KRVH VXFKDV/HLEQL]DQG.DQWLQRWKHUFHQWXULHVZKRKHOGWRWKHLQ¿QLWHSHUIHFW- ibility of man saw the time after t3 as simply a natural extension of the period 56 before t3. It is this model which Oliver Wendell Holmes contemplates in his poem, The Chambered Nautilus. The nautilus is a tropical sea mollusk having a many-chambered, spiral shell, with a pearly interior. It builds new and lon- JHUFKDPEHUVKRXVHVLQWRWKHPDQGVHDOVRIIWKHODVW5HÀHFWLQJXSRQWKLV FUHDWXUHDQGWKHVKHOOZKLFKLW¿QDOO\OHDYHVEHKLQGDVLWVPRUWDOUHPDLQV Holmes wrote: Year after year behold this silent toil What spread his lustrous coil; Still, as the spiral grew, He left the past year’s dwelling for the new, Stole with soft step its shining archway through, Built up its idle door Stretched in his last-found home and know no more. $QGWKHQ+ROPHV¿QGVDPHVVDJHEURXJKWWRKLPE\WKLVIUHDN\OLVWFUHDWXUH It is: Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul As the swift seasons roll! Leave thy low-vaulted past! Let each new temple, nobler than the last, Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, Till thou at length art free, Leaving thine outgrown shell by life’s unarresting sea. So, then, with our analysis and arguments, we offer you these two pictures to aid your imagination: one of what a disembodied existence might be like; the other of what a substance (or persons) who could move from embodied to disembodied existence might look like. The pictures, of course, do not

56. See, e.g., Gottfried Leibniz, Discourse on Metaphysics, sec. 46, and Immanuel Kant, Metaphysics of Morals, sec. 446–7. DALLAS WILLARD AND BRANDON RICKABAUGH 515 prove anything about the reality of such an existence or of a transition to it. They are not offered for that purpose, but to aid you in imagining what such realities might be like. Evidence for such realities must lie in the quarters already indicated.

4. Conclusion

But what, you may ask, does all of this have to do with the price of college and the climate change? Well, let us put it to you this way: in our sermonic and idealistic and moralistic moments, we make much of respect- ing and loving and valuing persons. We say, along with many others, that life cannot go on in this earth unless we learn to treasure persons. We submit that a part of our problem in this respect derives from an implicit view of what a human being is. If a human being is only an ambulatory, oblong piece of meat and bone, a dense electron cloud, or a natural feedback mechanism of great complexity, you can talk of respect, admiration, love for such a thing all you wish, but the reality of such emotions and maturations will come forth only if you succeed in thinking of human being as something a great deal more than just that. We live in a time where deep uncertainties about what we are drive private and political dynamics for how we live and love others. We think it has yet to be proven that any humanly desirable society can exist without being based on what could best be called a spiritualistic view of the human person.57 We have tried in this paper to give some basis for inferring that such a view needn’t be an illusion and is even likely to be true.

57. For more on this point, see, Dallas Willard, “Grey Matter and the Soul,” in Renewing the Christian Mind, ed. Dallas Willard and Gary Black, Jr. (New York: HarperCollins, 2016), 158–60; Dallas Willard, “Understanding the Person: Including the Invisible Parts,” in Living in Christ’s Presence (Downers Grover, IL: InterVarsity, 2013), 114–25; Dallas Willard, Renova- tion of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2002), chaps. 2 and 11; Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy, 79–93; and Dallas Willard, “Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation, and the Restoration of the Soul,” Journal of Psychology and Theology 26 (1998): 101–9.